The present invention is related generally to the field of healthcare management applications. Specifically, the present invention is related to an application that generates a graphical case presentation of a course of treatment using a single mouse click to assemble all necessary information for a diagnosed case from a healthcare management application and consolidate the information into a concise and presentable form for the patient.
Although the tools of the healthcare trade have changed and evolved over the years, the basic practice of medicine or dentistry has always consisted of diagnosing the condition of a patient, charting or documenting the condition, planning the course of treatment, constructing and presenting the treatment plan to the patient, selling or explaining the treatment plan to the patient, and then performing the subsequent work. Healthcare professionals go through rigorous formal education on the medical and clinical aspects above: diagnosing, charting, planning treatment, and performing treatment. However, the construction, presentation, and selling of proposed treatments are not the major focus of a healthcare professional's education.
The billing for healthcare procedures is established as a standard set of codes developed and approved by the governing organizational body. In the case of dentistry, it is the American Dental Association (ADA). Dental billing codes are known as the CDT-3 codes (Current Dental Terminology Revision 3) and are often referred to as the “ADA codes” or procedure codes that define the specific treatments administered and billed for by a dentist. An example ADA code is D3333, which defines the internal root repair of perforation defects procedure. All dentists use this standard nomenclature for defining work planned or performed. Both the ADA and the insurance industry abide by this standard. Similar sets of codes exist in other healthcare arenas.
With the advances in technology over the past 20 years and specifically the development of powerful desktop computers, the practice of healthcare has evolved to take advantage of these new tools and technological advances that improve productivity and generate new revenue opportunities for the healthcare professional. In the case of dentistry, most dental offices today use practice and clinical management software to automate the daily tasks of running a dental office. Although information and functionality vary among the different systems on the market, most track critical information such as guarantors, patients, insurance information, medical history, prescriptions, billing information, recall information, treatment plans and work performed, full restorative dental charts, periodontal charts, digital x-rays, digital camera images and estimated insurance payments. Practice management software has become one of the de facto desktop computer applications for the dental field. The use of practice management software is also prevalent in other healthcare disciplines.
In parallel with the advancement of the “Healthcare Desktop Application”, powerful general business software has evolved during the same period. One type of business software tool that has been developed automates the task of organizing and creating presentations. The created presentations are frequently in the form of slide shows. Examples of this type of tool include Microsoft PowerPoint®, StarOffice Impress from Sun Microsystems or any other similar type of presentation tool. These presentation tools afford the user the ability to quickly and easily assemble, organize, generate and show powerful presentations, in video slide or printed formats, to an individual or group. However, even with presentation software tools it is still difficult and time consuming for a healthcare professional to use the presentation software to generate a presentation on proposed courses of treatment for a patient. The healthcare professional must take the time to generate each slide individually, or at a minimum, copy and edit previously used slides. In addition, the transfer of the patient's information into the presentation software is not automatic, leaving many opportunities for errors.
Therefore, what is needed is an application that permits a healthcare professional to generate quickly and easily a presentation of proposed treatments for a patient that includes current and accurate information about the patient.